U.S. Jobs Number Disappoints
Friday morning, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the July 2026 Employment Situation Report. Nonfarm payrolls plunged 23,000 versus Wall Street estimates of +80,000. The payroll miss was one of the largest on record and represented a 5-sigma miss. For context, a 5-sigma miss is the equivalent of 1 in 3.5 million. Said differently, at one job report per month, a miss that size would show up about once every 290,000 years.
Image Source: Zerohedge
The losses were mostly due to local government education (-50,000), retail trade (-19,000), and leisure and hospitality (-26,000 to 40,000). Macroeconomic headwinds such as higher energy prices, increased operating costs and squeezed transportation, retail, and hospitality companies. Meanwhile, although today’s miss was notable, the downtrend is nothing new. Non-farm payrolls have trended downward for four consecutive months.
Image Source: Zerohedge
Why the Jobs Shock is Bullish for Equities
For Wall Street investors, they must separate the economy from the stock market. Prolonged jobs losses are bearish for stocks. However, with the unemployment rate still relatively low at 4.1%, the jobs miss is actually bullish for equities. That’s because the main driver of equities is central-bank-driven liquidity.
“Earnings don’t move the overall market; it’s the Federal Reserve Board… focus on the central banks, and focus on the movement of liquidity… most people in the market are looking for earnings and conventional measures. It’s liquidity that moves markets.” ~ Stanley Druckenmiller
Before today’s job numbers, it looked as if Fed Chair Kevin Warsh would need to hike interest rates to fight inflation. In fact, three members of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) voted to raise interest rates at the Federal Reserve’s latest monetary policy meeting. However, the latest data from betting markets suggest that a September rate hike is highly unlikely. According to the Polymarket betting market, September rate-hike odds plunged from nearly 60% in early August to ~35% today.
Image Source: Polymarket
AI Stocks Stabilize
A key part of the market to watch is the a AI industry. AI investment accounted for a whopping 50% of Q1 GDP growth. Tech stocks are coming off one of their most volatile months in years. However, leading AI stocks are showing signs of stabilization. For instance, Palantir (PLTR) jumped 30% after smashing Wall Street expectations. After post-IPO corrections SpaceX (SPCX) and Cerebras (CBRS) are trying to round out the right side of IPO base structures. Meanwhile, NVIDIA (NVDA), the leading AI stock, finally showed some life, jumping more than 10% this week.
Bottom Line
Friday’s job number was a rare 5-sigma miss. While the negative jobs number is bad news for the economy, it is positive for stocks because it means the Fed is less likely to raise interest rates.
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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
